Planned in 1954, the same year that the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Brown v. Board of Education made school segregation illegal, the Hunton Branch YMCA is locally significant as the only purpose-built YMCA for African American residents in Lynchburg and one of the few remaining buildings that historically provided recreational space for the city’s Black community, in particular men and boys. Located on 12th Street, a main thoroughfare connecting the Diamond Hill neighborhood to the historic Dunbar High School and Lynchburg’s downtown, the International Style building was designed by prominent local architect Pendleton Clark and has remained an active recreational center up to the present. While the national YMCA formally desegregated in 1946, the Hunton Branch in Lynchburg remained separate from the Central Virginia YMCA from its opening in 1956 until 1965, when the Lynchburg YMCA implemented an open-membership integration policy.